Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#281

Post by rrdharan » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:11 PM UTC

alangibson wrote: post #280

US-based meta-comment: I see lots of talk in this thread about the problem of customers just wanting to shout at customer support. Maybe I've got election brain, but does anyone else think this is a symptom of the frustration people feel under a political system that no longer responds to the legitimate grievances of people on the bottom of the social and economic order.

I don’t think Amazon customers posting here about their frustration are anywhere near the bottom of the social and economic order.

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#282

Post by unishark » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:12 PM UTC

adamparsons wrote: post #73

gnopgnip wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon requires mediation or arbitration, so there is no access to the judicial system

Perhaps this is the issue, having a legal system that you can opt out of. Sounds godawful.

Why is arbitration so bad exactly? The implication seems to be that Amazon has a better chance of winning, but I never see how that is backed up.

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#283

Post by Schweigi » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:13 PM UTC

tssva wrote: post #211

gwd wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article quotes the two reviews which claim the items are fake; it's pretty clear the people are just throwing out the claim of "fake" to get leverage. Amazon asked the seller for the receipts from the manufacturers to prove that they were real; he gave them, but Amazon said they didn't count because they were more than a year old. But that's when he actually bought the merchandise, so I'm not sure what Amazon exp…

"Amazon said they didn't count because they were more than a year old." According to the seller that was Amazon's issue with the receipts. According to Amazon the issue was the receipts provided were either illegible or didn't match records from the manufacturers. In other words they appeared to be faked receipts.

Amazon nowhere says that the invoices appear to be fake. Amazon’s reply is: “Illegible or didn't match records” - Illegible can mean anything, for example older as 365 days, as stated in the article. The second part about records not matching is just company speak to make it look like the vendor is to blame. It’s intentionally vague. My wife worked as a vendor manager at Amazon and she never checked any manufacturer receipts/had a way to check them.

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#284

Post by londons_explore » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:13 PM UTC

sjansen wrote: post #255

mwexler wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in 2003, Seldon and Colvin wrote a pretty good book about Angel Customers and Demon Customers ( http://geoffcolvin.com/books/angel-customers-demon-customers... ) which examines many of these issues. A bit of friction, if applied correctly, is not a terrible thing if an interaction's cost outweighs it's value. Getting the balance right is tricky but worth considering some alternatives to just "putting up with it"…

> A bit of friction, if applied correctly, is not a terrible thing I observed the same thing in a different context in my previous gig doing Linux training. We strived to make our books as clear and simple as possible. When we discovered streps in our labs that confused students, we would rewrite them to avoid repeating the problem in future classes. Eventually I started noticing a tipping point where if the lab did…

I once ran an ecommerce site, and due to a bug every customer saw a fairly cryptic error message. It was something along the lines of "You must login to perform that action". Our site didn't have a login system.

By fixing that bug, conversions went down. We literally did an A/B test to prove that giving the user a stupid error increased revenue. We even played with the text of the error to maximize revenue.

We never figured out why, but my hypothesis is the user has to feel like that are making progress through the task they are trying to achieve. Getting a pointless error, and then getting past it, gives them a sense of achievement. They're then happier and more invested in your product when it comes to plugging in a credit card number...

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#285

Post by detaro » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:15 PM UTC

unishark wrote: post #282

adamparsons wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps this is the issue, having a legal system that you can opt out of. Sounds godawful.

Why is arbitration so bad exactly? The implication seems to be that Amazon has a better chance of winning, but I never see how that is backed up.

Arbitration is done by a company picked by Amazon, paid by Amazon, hoping to remain in business with Amazon, deciding about a conflict between Amazon and a random customer. In whose direction are they likely to err?

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#286

Post by rrdharan » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:17 PM UTC

jodrellblank wrote: post #150

Google234 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doubt that is true. Every company has internal policies to stop favoritism like that.

Actual Googler looking into a complaint personally happening on HN - 9 years ago - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2795465 "[Googler], can you suggest a strategy for dealing with Google support issues that doesn't involve "get Matt Cutt's attention on Hacker News"? - 9 years ago - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2797972 "Guess we won't be able to get Google support from Matt on HN this month. :)" - https://…

How many of these are actually first hand versus just repeating / referencing earlier collective HN “knowledge” (or hearsay)?

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#287

Post by megous » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:18 PM UTC

bagacrap wrote: post #272

Lazare wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At least four customers complained that the merchandise was not authentic. According to the article, one customer said the item didn't fit, and wondered if it might be a knock-off, but they didn't outright claim it was. And the other three complained about packaging. Depending on how you score it that's ZERO customers complaining, or maybe one at most. > The evidence of authenticity was illegible. [...] And this is…

"either illegible or didn't match the records of the brand owners" --- so Amazon has done some due diligence by reaching out to other parties to the sales, and found that these receipts are likely counterfeit. Besides which, I'm not sure how even valid receipts prove that the inventory is legit; how do you know the receipts refer to this particular merchandise and not some other legitimate purchase? It seems entirely…

Sounds like a good cautionary tale for others, so why not?

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#288

Post by alangibson » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:19 PM UTC

rrdharan wrote: post #281

alangibson wrote: post #280

US-based meta-comment: I see lots of talk in this thread about the problem of customers just wanting to shout at customer support. Maybe I've got election brain, but does anyone else think this is a symptom of the frustration people feel under a political system that no longer responds to the legitimate grievances of people on the bottom of the social and economic order.

I don’t think Amazon customers posting here about their frustration are anywhere near the bottom of the social and economic order.

I'm not referencing them. I'm referencing the discussions about perpetually irate, toxic customers.

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#289

Post by mindcrime » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:23 PM UTC

AussieWog93 wrote: post #273

mindcrime wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a little off-topic, but since we're already on this: I just wanted to say "great job" on the Labrador. I don't even need one (I have benchtop scope, power supply, signal generator, logic analyzer, etc. already, and a couple of Bus Pirates) but couldn't resist ordering one just to acknowledge the awesomeness of your work.

Thanks so much. I've had a bit of a lousy week, so seeing random strangers say positive things on the internet has been a Godsend.

I've had a bit of a lousy week

Sorry to hear that. I hope the rest of your week, and the week to come, are absolutely awesome to make up for it!

Re: Amazon destroys $1.5m of sellers inventory – now homeless

#290

Post by totalZero » Wed, Oct 28, 2020, 3:23 PM UTC

alangibson wrote: post #280

US-based meta-comment: I see lots of talk in this thread about the problem of customers just wanting to shout at customer support. Maybe I've got election brain, but does anyone else think this is a symptom of the frustration people feel under a political system that no longer responds to the legitimate grievances of people on the bottom of the social and economic order.

In my experience, the quality of customer support has degraded as the volume of sales in the online marketplace has increased. Recently, I had an Amazon customer service supervisor in India (or at least, everyone in the chain had an Indian name and they didn't seem to understand the difference between USPS and UPS) mouth off to me about an issue that eventually resulted in a refund and apology from someone in the USA.

I imagine it is even worse for sellers, because they aren't traditionally viewed as "customers" (thus they are not "always right") and many of them are indeed pushing counterfeit merchandise -- especially when it comes to shoes and apparel. I would not be surprised if Amazon characterizes seller support as a cost center, rather than a profit center.

Personally, when it comes to oft-counterfeited items, I view a brick-and-mortar presence as an indicator of greater trustworthiness. For me, the takeaway from the story about Mr. Govani's lost inventory is that (A) Amazon's seller support is poor, (B) Amazon has no idea how to counteract its problem with rampant counterfeiting, (C) Amazon doesn't see much value in treating sellers as customers of its platform, and (D) Mr. Govani moved way too much existing inventory to Amazon rather than transitioning gradually with freshly acquired product.